As the Edinburgh Festival looms closer, the economics of performing at the Fringe are predictably back in the spotlight.

Concerns are once again being raised that costs associated with producing shows at the Festival – in particular the costs of renting accommodation during August – are simply becoming too high, freezing many performers and producers out.

Among those raising concerns is producer Francesca Moody, whose past Fringe productions include hit shows ‘Fleabag’ and ‘Baby Reindeer’, both of which obviously went on to become successful TV shows.

She tells The Scotsman that when she brought her first theatre show to the Fringe in 2011, the full cost of the production was £10,000. But today, “that’s what the accommodation is going to cost you on its own”, she says, adding, “I certainly would have struggled to take work for the first time up there now”.

Surging production and accommodation costs, Moody reckons, “means that the majority of the work that gets to the Fringe is either work that’s already backed by somebody with money – which requires you to have established yourself a little bit in the industry – or just super commercial work”.

Those productions definitely have a role to play in the Fringe programme, Moody goes on, but – she says – many of the truly great shows to come out of the Fringe over the decades were created by performers who were “unencumbered by other people and voices”.

Performers who were also “giving themselves permission to just be a bit scrappy and and try something out and not be afraid to fail”. That “obviously becomes harder when things get more expensive”.

The economics of the Fringe have been a cause for concern for years, if not decades, of course. Though there is a sense that, since the pandemic, costs have risen to such an extent that, for an increasing number of performers and producers, the risk of staging of a show at the Fringe just isn’t worth it.

Even if the Festival is still a great place for honing your craft, building an audience and finding an industry network.

Many look to the Fringe Society and the city of Edinburgh to find solutions to these challenges, though at least some of the solutions are likely to come from within the Fringe community itself.

Indeed, 30 years ago what became the Free Fringe was launched to provide an alternative and more affordable model for stand-up comedians who were struggling with the increasing costs associated with hiring a space in one of the more established venues.

Moody herself has also come up with a new initiative to help performers appear at the Fringe without the usual financial risk. She is launching a new venue during the Fringe at the Edinburgh College Of Art which will operate under the name of Shedinburgh, a brand she first used for an online venture during the pandemic.

This venture will operate on a different model to that employed by many of the Fringe’s other venues. The classic model sees the performer or producer of the show covering the upfront costs of the production, either paying a rental fee to the venue and/or entering into a box office split arrangement.

With Shedinburgh, performers will be paid a fee, and have their travel and accommodation costs funded.

“As a company and an individual which had so much success at the Fringe and was able to make it work there at a time where it felt a little bit more like a level playing field”, Moody explains, “I think we just feel really passionately that we wanted to try and find new ways of reimagining that Fringe model”.

Shedinburgh will also be different to most other Fringe venues in that each performer will appear for one night only, rather than doing a run of shows. Among those already confirmed to perform are Jayde Adams and Mark Watson.